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Yesterday we talked about leaving the ordinary world. That’s the world where people are not walking their own paths, but instead are following the paths that outside forces say you should follow.

 

if you’re hearing a call to live more aligned with your purpose, then you’re hearing The Call to Purpose. It’s where you seek an adventure to learn more about yourself and do more in your life. 

 

A hero feels a call to adventure when they need to leave the ordinary world and set off for a life-changing adventure.Perhaps you’re in an unsatisfying job or you’re taking another class for another degree, but it doesn’t feel perfect. It’s time now to choose your own path.

 

Are you ready to accept this mission? 

 

Here are 5 things to do when you hear The Call to Purpose.

 

 

What’s a quest, you ask? A quest is a goal so epic that it scares you. It challenges you to be more and do more. Here are a couple examples of what people have already done, ranging from high school students bored with standard curriculum and sitting in rows for 8 hours a day to the corporate employee bored in his job.

 

-Buy a Website and Blog for 67 Days (this needs to be public so the world can see it)
-Write a Book/Movie
-Launch a Youtube Channel
-Obtain a Certain Fitness Goal or Weight-loss Goal

-Go Vegan (and Create a Vegan Cookbook)

-Ride a Motorcycle Around the World (Yes, someone really has done look. Check out the Your Life on Purpose episode w/ Leon Logothetis. I can’t make this stuff up.)

        -      Write a love letter every day to your significant other

 

Remember that you will always have the chance to go on another quest, so don’t worry about picking the right one right now. Stop deciding and start doing.

 

And if you are stuck on what would be the quest you’d like to start, here’s an easy way to find out.

 

List all of the things you are interested in doing. Keep on going and writing down this list until you feel your core shake or begin to shed tears. Fear can be a beautiful guide to knowing what is most important to your life.

 

 

The research says that it takes roughly two months, 66 days to be exact, to develop a new daily habit. Do something small for at least 5 minutes that relates to your quest every day for 67 days.

 

3.  Create at least one SMART goal for your quest. It needs to be specific, measurable, actionable, realistic, and time-based (it needs to be accomplished within two months time).

 

4. Think of the reason behind your quest. This is called your why. 

 

5. Make a pledge to accomplish your quest and share it with an accountability partner like your best friend or a lover. I call this The Purpose Manifesto.

 

As you go throughout your day today, imagine what will be different once you accomplish your quest. Every time you think of a situation, stop and fully recognize it. Take a mental snapshot of this moment. Embrace it. This is your destiny.

 

As you think about what quest you would like to go on, understand that failing can sometimes be the best learning opportunity, but for whatever reason we, as a society, have looked at failure as a bad thing. Heroes recognize that if you’re not failing, you’re not trying hard enough. Fail. Reflect on your failures. Grow better. This is called failing forward and heroes have it tattooed on their soul.

 

Jean Kilbourne knows The Call to Purpose all too well. A former model in the 1960’s, Jean began to see how advertisements were manipulating images of women: erasing blemishes, increasing bust lines, and at some times even creating completely fabricated women through some nifty copy and pasting. 

 

At home, Jean began to the influence these advertisements had on young woman. Jean heard The Call to Purpose and began her adventurous mission that produced the extremely popular documentary called Killing Us Softy. 

 

It was truly an honor to get to sit down for a chat with Ms. Kilbourne. I’ve been a big fan of her work since I first watched Killing Us Softy in college. If you haven’t seen the video, you need to check it out. It’s a perfect example of the kind of art that comes out of a person when they take on a quest. 

 

Tomorrow, I’ll dive into Level 3 of The Hero’s Journey where we face “The Refusal of the Call”. It’s a dark place and the way to get through has everything to do with how we react to stress.